Top 8 Windows Apps to Help You Be More Productive

Productivity is difficult to achieve in a world full of distractions and complications. Simplifying the process of getting things done would greatly increase your productivity during the typical day. If you find yourself struggling to be productive, I have compiled a list of Windows applications to help you increase your productivity and make your life a little easier.

Sharing files via email can be incredibly cumbersome. If you are attempting to share a large file with your friends or co-workers, it’s likely that the majority of email services will not even allow you to upload and send the file as an attachment. If your line of work requires a large amount of file sharing and collaboration, Google Drive is an excellent tool for the job.

By default, Google Drive offers you 5GBs of free storage space. If necessary, you have the ability to pay Google a monthly fee and utilize up to 16TB of online storage. Google Drive allows you to select a folder on your computer and have that folder synced to the cloud automatically. This application has saved me an abundance of time in the past.

College and high school students are very familiar with the tedious process of taking notes during a long lecture. Anything that can make the process any easier is typically embraced by students.

Evernote is an excellent tool for organizing and keeping track of your notes. For example, when you save your notes in class, Evernote will then upload them to the cloud as well as download them to any other device you have Evernote installed on. This eliminates the possibility of losing your notes due to hard drive failure and removes the need to scramble to find your notes just before an exam. I speak from experience when I say that Evernote is a lifesaver.

I always cringe when I observe someone using notepad to edit HTML or CSS. I don’t think they realize just how inefficient notepad is as a text editor. If you happen to be a web developer or even if you’re just starting to obtain an interest in development, you can’t go wrong with Sublime Text 2.

Sublime Text is my favorite text editor on Windows. It features a slick, distraction-free interface and possesses all the features you need to get your work done as efficiently as possible.

Keeping your life organized can make the typical day go by a lot easier. However, organizing all the events that take place in your day isn’t necessarily a pleasant process.

Wunderlist is a free task management application that can help you take control of your schedule with ease. Not only does Wunderlist look fantastic, it works very well and supports a wide variety of devices and synchronizes your schedule between all of them. Wunderlist is a very useful tool if you often find yourself forgetting about important tasks at work or school.

Remote desktop applications are incredibly useful. However, the extent of their capabilities is limited by their lack of fluidity. Splashtop provides you with a smooth, low-latency experience and feels as though you never left your computer.

If you typically work with applications such as Photoshop, Premier, or Illustrator and find that you need to make a last minute change to a design or video while on the go, a remote desktop app is a great solution. However, it’s vital that you are able to use these applications without experiencing any performance deficiencies. Splashtop has the potential to stream your desktop at 30 FPS and can even allow you to play modern games from another computer or even a phone or tablet.

Working late into the night is never a pleasant experience. Not only are you losing beauty sleep, staring at your computer screen for hours in the dark is harmful to your eyes. Eye strain can exaggerate the need for sleep and eventually result in incomplete work.

Flux is an application that adjusts the brightness and tint of your display according to the time of day. For example, during the night hours, Flux will adjust your screen so that it appears to be warmer and will increase the brightness and reduce the tint during the day. Flux has not only made it easier for me to fall asleep, but it has also made it easier for me to stay awake.

Keeping your online accounts secure is becoming quite a challenge. It’s recommended that you use different passwords on every website and that they are at least 12 characters in length. If you follow both of these steps, remembering all of your passwords is nearly impossible. LastPass is a password manager that allows you to keep separate and secure passwords on any website and allows you to access your accounts with the click of a button.

LastPass uses a master password to access randomly generated passwords for specific domains. I have been using LastPass for a few years and have never had to reset a password via email since.

If you tend to be paranoid about security, LastPass allows you to use two-step authentication so nobody can access your master password without having access to your phone as well. LastPass is an excellent tool to help you keep your accounts secure and save you time in the process.

Communicating with clients and coworkers can be frustrating at times. The situation becomes particularly annoying if the individuals you are making an attempt to communicate with are all using different services. Typically, this will require multiple pieces of software that you have to install and configure.

Pidgin is a free and lightweight all-in-one IM client. It allows you to connect multiple IM accounts and interact with all of your clients and coworkers from one program. I refuse to use any IM client other than Pidgin and would highly recommend it to anyone not already using it.